Mr. Pethick-Lawrence for Labour spoke too long, but on the
whole did well in concealing the dilemma in which the Opposition fmd themselves. Their disinclination to trust this particular Government with so much as an air pistol cannot be reconciled by any trick of argument with their belief that some time some Government must possess and may have to use overwhelming force to resist Fascist aggression. It was therefore to be expected that the main force of his criticism should be directed towards gloomy forecasts of the probable economic consequences of injecting the stimulus of large loan expenditure into a system now rapidly approach- ing a state of boom. Points must be awarded to Mr. Arthur Henderson, who by an interruption drew from the Chancellor the statement that it was against public policy to theorise as to who our allies might be in any future war. Sir Archibald Sinclair was able to use this statement to suggest an inconsis- tency between the foreign policy of the Chancellor and of Mr. Eden which the Prime Minister will do well to clear up in his final reply.
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